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RE: [b-hebrew] Prophetic Perfect? Psalm 107

From: furuli AT online.no
To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: RE: [b-hebrew] Prophetic Perfect? Psalm 107
Date: Sun, 23 May 2004 19:51:46 +0200

Dear Liz,

When you ask me, I would guess the bird was a swan, because that would be more likely statistically speaking. But as a scientist I would not venture a guess. Because I am aware of the existence of white crows, according to your words, the birds could have been a crows as well.

Please note that my illustration was related to the all-proposition "all swans are white," and the falsification principle works in cases that are similar to all-propositions. To parts of the Hebrew verbal system the falsification principle can be applied. Please consider the following:

On p. 95 in the work "The Evolution of Grammar, Tense, Aspect, and Modality in the Languages of the World (1994), J. Bybee, R. Perkins, and W. Pagliuca states that simple past cannot express future events. This is almost a truism, and few, if any would disagree with that. On the basis of this we can make the following all-proposition: A Hebrew conjugation with the semantic meaning "past tense" will not have verbs with future reference. This means that if a reasonable number of verbs from this conjugation have future reference, the claim of the conjugation being past tense is falsified.

Waltke/O'Connor (1990:460) applies this principle to the Hebrew conjugations: "How can forms each of which "represent" all three English major tenses have a primary temporal value?"

And even more interesting, W. L. Moran did this to the Canaanite verbal system as witnessed by the Amarna letters in 1950 (Moran, W. L., "A Syntactical Study of the Dialect of Byblos as Reflected in the Amarna Tablets" (Ph. D. diss., The Johns Hopkins University, 1950) = Amarna Studies: Collected Writings (ed. J. Huehnergard and S. Izre'el; HSS 54; Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2003) 1-130.

Note how A. Rainey (1996 II:6) in his four volume work on Northwest Semitic (Amarna) grammar endorses Moran's view (Rainey, A. F. (1996). Canaanite in the Amarna tablets : a linguistic analysis of the mixed dialect used by the scribes from Canaan, 4 vols. Handbuch der Orientalistik. 1. Abteilung, Der Nahe und Mittlere Osten, ed. B. Spuler.):

"Both transitive and stative forms could serve to express past, present or future meaning. The suffix conjugation did not, therefore, express completed action or state as taught by S. R. Driver (1892:13-26; Moran 1950a:34)."

We should note that Moran's QATALs, on which he drew his conclusions, were few: 122 with present reference, 33 with future reference and 100 with past reference. On this basis he viewed Driver's claim as falsified!

In many cases the distinction between semantic meaning and conversational pragmatic implicature is difficult to establish. But Peter draws this too far, because there are many areas of language where the difference is clear-cut, as in connection with verbs. Of course, falsifying examples must have a secure foundation (textually, contextually etc), and even exceptions can be allowed if they can be linguistically explained. But the main proposition stands: A verb conjugation which semantically represents past tense cannot have future reference.

The fact that the infinitive absolute is used for narrative accounts in Phoenician, and to some degree in the Amarna letters, has no direct bearing on the falsification principle. But this fact illuminates the case with the WAYYIQTOLs from another angle. If infinitive absolutes, which nobody would say semantically represent past tense, are used as the narrative verb form, then the WAYYIQTOLs neither need to represent semantically past tense, just because they in great numbers are used in narrative accounts. Why some say they cannot understand this simple fact is difficult for me to understand.

Best regards

Rolf

Rolf Furuli
University of Oslo

The reference to white swans and induction is extremely interesting.
Let us say that you saw 1000 white swans and 2 black ones.
Further let's say that you saw 1000 black crows and (for argument's sake)
two white ones.
Now suppose I told you that there is a white bird out there.
Would you assume it to be a swan or a crow?
Liz

-----Original Message-----
From: b-hebrew-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org
[mailto:b-hebrew-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Peter Kirk
Sent: Saturday, May 22, 2004 2:23 PM
To: furuli AT online.no
Cc: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Prophetic Perfect? Psalm 107

On 20/05/2004 14:01, furuli AT online.no wrote:

>
> ...
>
> To ignore the examples that contradict one's view with the argument
> that they are errors, does not recommend itself as a good
scientific
> method. Errors will occur, but they must be shown to be
errors on the
> basis of a scientific analysis. If you have studied the
Philosophy of
> science, you should be familiar with the problem of induction; one
> million white swans do not prove that all swans are white, but two
> black swans, who are not dyed or have gone through a fire, will
> falsify the hypothesis. Thus, the 1.000 non-past WAYYIQTOLs are a
> stronger basis for saying that WAYYIQTOL is not
semantically speaking
> past tense than the 12.000 WAYYIQTOLs occurring in past
narratives. ...

>

From rburks9400 AT comcast.net Sun May 23 14:10:51 2004

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Date: Sun, 23 May 2004 13:10:09 -0500
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Prophetic Perfect? Psalm 107
From: Richard Burks <rburks9400 AT comcast.net>
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On 5/23/04 12:51 PM, "furuli AT online.no" <furuli AT online.no> wrote:
By the way Liz ... Rolf is another one who I read his memos with interest.

Bill Burks

Dear Liz,

When you ask me, I would guess the bird was a swan, because that
would be more likely statistically speaking. But as a scientist I
would not venture a guess. Because I am aware of the existence of
white crows, according to your words, the birds could have been a
crows as well.

Please note that my illustration was related to the all-proposition
"all swans are white," and the falsification principle works in cases
that are similar to all-propositions. To parts of the Hebrew verbal
system the falsification principle can be applied. Please consider
the following:

On p. 95 in the work "The Evolution of Grammar, Tense, Aspect, and
Modality in the Languages of the World (1994), J. Bybee, R. Perkins,
and W. Pagliuca states that simple past cannot express future events.
This is almost a truism, and few, if any would disagree with that. On
the basis of this we can make the following all-proposition: A Hebrew
conjugation with the semantic meaning "past tense" will not have
verbs with future reference. This means that if a reasonable number
of verbs from this conjugation have future reference, the claim of
the conjugation being past tense is falsified.

Waltke/O'Connor (1990:460) applies this principle to the Hebrew
conjugations: "How can forms each of which "represent" all three
English major tenses have a primary temporal value?"

And even more interesting, W. L. Moran did this to the Canaanite
verbal system as witnessed by the Amarna letters in 1950 (Moran, W.
L., "A Syntactical Study of the Dialect of Byblos as Reflected in the
Amarna Tablets" (Ph. D. diss., The Johns Hopkins University, 1950) =
Amarna Studies: Collected Writings (ed. J. Huehnergard and S.
Izre'el; HSS 54; Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2003) 1-130.

Note how A. Rainey (1996 II:6) in his four volume work on Northwest
Semitic (Amarna) grammar endorses Moran's view (Rainey, A. F. (1996).
Canaanite in the Amarna tablets : a linguistic analysis of the mixed
dialect used by the scribes from Canaan, 4 vols. Handbuch der
Orientalistik. 1. Abteilung, Der Nahe und Mittlere Osten, ed. B.
Spuler.):

"Both transitive and stative forms could serve to express past,
present or future meaning. The suffix conjugation did not, therefore,
express completed action or state as taught by S. R. Driver
(1892:13-26; Moran 1950a:34)."

We should note that Moran's QATALs, on which he drew his conclusions,
were few: 122 with present reference, 33 with future reference and
100 with past reference. On this basis he viewed Driver's claim as
falsified!

In many cases the distinction between semantic meaning and
conversational pragmatic implicature is difficult to establish. But
Peter draws this too far, because there are many areas of language
where the difference is clear-cut, as in connection with verbs. Of
course, falsifying examples must have a secure foundation (textually,
contextually etc), and even exceptions can be allowed if they can be
linguistically explained. But the main proposition stands: A verb
conjugation which semantically represents past tense cannot have
future reference.

The fact that the infinitive absolute is used for narrative accounts
in Phoenician, and to some degree in the Amarna letters, has no
direct bearing on the falsification principle. But this fact
illuminates the case with the WAYYIQTOLs from another angle. If
infinitive absolutes, which nobody would say semantically represent
past tense, are used as the narrative verb form, then the WAYYIQTOLs
neither need to represent semantically past tense, just because they
in great numbers are used in narrative accounts. Why some say they
cannot understand this simple fact is difficult for me to understand.

Best regards

Rolf

Rolf Furuli
University of Oslo

The reference to white swans and induction is extremely interesting.
Let us say that you saw 1000 white swans and 2 black ones.
Further let's say that you saw 1000 black crows and (for argument's sake)
two white ones.
Now suppose I told you that there is a white bird out there.
Would you assume it to be a swan or a crow?
Liz

-----Original Message-----
From: b-hebrew-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org
[mailto:b-hebrew-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Peter Kirk
Sent: Saturday, May 22, 2004 2:23 PM
To: furuli AT online.no
Cc: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Prophetic Perfect? Psalm 107

On 20/05/2004 14:01, furuli AT online.no wrote:

...

To ignore the examples that contradict one's view with the argument
that they are errors, does not recommend itself as a good

scientific

method. Errors will occur, but they must be shown to be

errors on the

basis of a scientific analysis. If you have studied the

Philosophy of

science, you should be familiar with the problem of induction; one
million white swans do not prove that all swans are white, but two
black swans, who are not dyed or have gone through a fire, will
falsify the hypothesis. Thus, the 1.000 non-past WAYYIQTOLs are a
stronger basis for saying that WAYYIQTOL is not

semantically speaking

past tense than the 12.000 WAYYIQTOLs occurring in past

narratives. ...

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Re: [b-hebrew] Prophetic Perfect? Psalm 107 , (continued)